Elite media hit job on Herman Cain backfires - UPDATED
[Editor's Note: Remember that Newsweek knew about Monica Lewinski and decided to try to kill the story so it was leaked to Matt Drudge. In the case of John Edwards many in the elite media knew about the affair, but all of them decided to cover it up until the National Inquirer broke the story.
Remember, the quality of the propaganda (read bullshit) is MUCH higher this election season. That is because it used to be aimed at Independents who started counting yard signs two weeks before an election. New attitude change propaganda is aimed at people sympathetic to the TEA Party which is most Independents. TEA/Independents are more politically informed so the new propaganda is smarter and designed to target conservative sensibilities as well as people's cynicism about government, so the lies from the hired political communications guns are based on variations of truths you have heard before. It is very effective.]
The video below is a textbook example of how to do an interview and deal with a false accusation. Cain's reaction over the weekend was to challenge the elite media to name names, who are these anonymous sources?
Notice the elite media's reaction to an accusation by anonymous sources, buy a known bogus hit piece writer from Politico (Vogel), compared to how they reacted to multiple women who spoke out against Bill Clinton including credible claims of rape (Juanita Brodderick) and sexual harassment/assault (Paula Jones, Dolly Kyle Browning, Kathleen Willey, Elizabeth Ward Gracen and the list goes on) and not to mention multiple affairs (Gennifer Flowers, Monica Lewinski). In the case of Bill Clinton they circled the wagons and attacked the women. The Democrats and the elite media even very personally attacked Linda Tripp who was simply a witness who told the truth about the evidence she had.
After the Clarence Thomas attack there was a surge of bogus sexual harassment suits in the 90's. Anyone who was a CEO would/could be a target of one. It is called a harassment suit.
Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Rick Perry, Herman Cain. Notice that the attacks came out when each one of these people was at their peak.
Yesterday was Herman Cain's best fundraising day ever.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNFhdMRT6Nw]
UPDATE -
Now the Elite Media is crying "cover up". The Cain Campiagn are staffed by political noobs whose messaging was muttered for the first daywhile they were trying to figure out from who and where this anonymous allegation came from.
The Cain Campaign has always done this when faced with a new issue or critique. It takes them a few days to get their footing just as it did on his Israel comments, abortion comments, answer to Homosexuality questions, the comments about not having Muslims in his administration etc. No one should be surprised that it was the same way with this curve ball.
The elite media doesn't want to talk about the allegation because their story is a joke and from an anonymous source. So the elite media watching the story become about the Politico reporters who havce posted made up quotes in hit pieces before about SAarah Palin and others, have decided to move the goal post and interpret Cains messaging problems on a "cover up".
According to witnesses in the incident Cain is aware of all he did was tell someone that they where about as tall as his wife and brought his hand to his chin, so she filed a harassment suit saying that Cain made a gesture that made her think of oral sex. Some official at the NRA paid her a small sum of money to go away. Harassment suits happen a lot. But here is the rub, since it is an anonymous source with few details Cain can not be sure if this is the incident or not.
Nice catch 22 isn't it? If it is about this incident than there was no sexual behavior at all and this means nothing, if it is not this incident it is from an anonymous source with next to no details so it still means nothing, in both cases there is nothing to cover up. Like we said, this is just the elite media moving the goal post because if they talk about the allegation the story becomes about the liberal reporter who has a history.
The Media Research Center varifies our memory:
Networks Hype Vague Cain Charges, Ignored Sexual Harassment Claims Against Clinton The three networks have aggressively covered vague charges of sexual harassment against Herman Cain, but brushed aside far more serious and specific claims against Bill Clinton. Since the Herman Cain sexual harassment story broke late Sunday night, the broadcast networks have covered it extensively: full stories on Monday's morning news shows (ABC's Good Morning America led off their broadcast); full stories on Monday's evening news shows (the CBS Evening News made it their top item) and ABC's Nightline; and the top story on all three Tuesday morning shows.
Good Morning America's George Stephanopoulos on Monday hyped the story as a "bombshell blast" and on Tuesday he derided Cain's "bizarre series of interviews" on the subject. On Tuesday's Early Show, Jan Crawford highlighted how Cain has been "trying to shoot down these allegations." NBC's Matt Lauer gloated that the Republican was "finding out the hard way about the attention that goes along with being a front-runner."
Cain's accusers are still anonymous. Three women publicly accused Bill Clinton of far more serious instances of sexual harassment in the 1990s, but the networks all but ignored them. The coverage that did exist was often skeptical, insulting and hostile, an astonishing double standard.
- Paula Jones, who accused Bill Clinton of exposing himself to her in a hotel room when she was a state employee in Arkansas, held a public press conference in February 1994, CBS and NBC ignored those charges, while ABC devoted just 16 seconds to Jones' press conference.
As a January 29, 1998 Media Reality Check pointed out, "The rest of the media waited three months, until Jones filed suit, and the networks then did just 21 stories in that month."
Appearing on the late Tim Russert's CNBC program, then-Nightly News anchor Tom Brokaw dismissed, "It didn't seem to most people, entirely relevant to what was going on at the time. These are the kind of charges raised about the President before."
In the Jones case, the networks were openly disdainful of covering her accusations. "It's a little tough to figure out who's being harassed," NBC Today host Bryant Gumbel smugly asserted (May 10, 1994).
After ABC's Sam Donaldson interviewed Jones for Prime Time Live in June 1994, anchor Charles Gibson wanted to know: "Why does anyone care what this woman has to say?"
Gibson continued to pile on, adding, "Bottom line, Sam: Is she not trying to capitalize on this, in effect to profit from impugning the President?"
Newsweek editor Evan Thomas, who sometimes appears on the networks to offer analysis, derided Jones as "some sleazy woman with big hair." (This was on the May 7, 1994 Inside Washington.)
- In the case of Kathleen Willey, who said Bill Clinton groped her in the Oval Office while President, the networks gave minimal coverage to that story when it was broke by Newsweek magazine in late July 1997.
On July 30, 1997, the CBS Evening News aired a story, but managed not to mention Willey by name. Reporter Bill Plante warned, "But unless and until this case is settled, this is only the beginning of attempts by attorneys on both sides to damage the reputations and credibility of everyone involved."
- In the case of Juanita Broaddrick, who publicly came forward to say Bill Clinton raped her while he was the Arkansas Attorney General and a candidate for Governor, the networks offered weekend coverage in March 1998, when the charge surfaced in a court filing by Paula Jones' attorneys. NBC interviewed Broaddrick for a Dateline special in January 1999, but the airing was delayed until February 24, 1999, after the end of Clinton's impeachment trial.
The March 1999 Media Watchpointed out the disparity of coverage of Broaddrick versus Anita Hill:
In the first five days of Hill’s charges (October 6-10,1991), the network evening shows (on ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and PBS’s NewsHour) aired 67 stories. (If a count began with Jones’ February press conference, the networks supplied just a single 16-second anchor brief; if the count began with her sexual harassment lawsuit against Clinton in May, the number was 15.)
But in the first five days after Juanita Broaddrick has charged the President with rape in The Wall Street Journal (February 19-23), the number of evening news stories was two. That’s a ratio of 67 to 2.
Is it any coincidence that each conservative candidiate from the last several elections was attacked when they peaked in the polls? Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, and now Herman Cain (remember how Sarah Palin was attacked?).
When you look at the history of minorities who ran as Republicans such as Michael Steele, Allen West, etc the Democrats in every case use the worst personal smear tactics against them, including releasing their social security numbers and personal credit information.
Remember Miguel Estrada who was picked by President Bush to be on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals? Democrats said in their leaked Judiciary Committee memo's that they must smear and defeat him "because he's Latino".
And surprise surprise, the attorney for said un-named source is Joel Bennet. Most people do not have any idea Joel Bennet is. He was the head of the DC bar, and a co-chair of the National bar Association. Bennet is a big time power lawyer in DC and was even featured in Super Lawyers magazine. So who do you suppose is bankrolling this guy? You can be sure that it is not a former staffer at the National Restaurant Association.